Where else can you order a pint of Canny Bevvy than 'oop North'.

One would have thought, in retirement, arising early on a Saturday and heading for distant cities and towns, would be one of the things I would not miss. Yet strangely I have a yearning to see how Sheffield’s development has progressed since I first went there back in the 1960s; to see the crooked spire at Chesterfield once more and take in the Victorian industrial architecture of Huddersfield again.

I did not get much time to visit the towns. We would arrive at noon, head for a curry house and then drive to the ground for a 3.0pm kick off. But over the years we gained a layer of knowledge of the respective venues, and such was the increase in traffic on the motorways, we had to leave earlier in the mornings, and spent any time available, at the end of the journey, sight-seeing.

Some three years ago, friends we made in Limousin, John and Muriel, decided to return to the north-east. John would have stayed in France, but Muriel hankered after a busier life than provided by the rural tranquillity of The Creuse.

They have a daughter in Switzerland so, when visiting her, they took a detour calling in at our new home in The Tarn last summer. We assured them we would pay a return visit: hence the trip up the motorways in May.

We planned to meet up at York, which Ellie has never seen, and we liaised up at a nice hotel and I pushed my wife round the Minster in a wheelchair, while John took over the role of dog-minder, taking our two King Charles through York’s streets.

However, it was a city which is not on the football map that impressed us most. John and Muriel took us to Durham the next day and Ellie vowed to return for a more thorough look, once her hip is replaced in July. It is an intriguing city.

From there we were taken to Sunderland, where we followed their car down through Roker, former home of Sunderland FC, to the sea, passing the old curry house we used to frequent before matches. In days gone by we would slip on the track by Chris Rea - Steel River, which charted poignantly the sad decline of the shipbuilding industry in those parts.

Then we headed into Newcastle and we thought this was impressive as we passed through the large central mall en route to St James’s Park.

The architecture and lay-out in central Newcastle was a good mixture of old and new and the Mall appeared to be stocked with high quality goods, suggesting there is money about, even “ooop north”. We finished up outside the home of Newcastle United and I had my photo taken alongside the tribute to my first schoolboy idol, Jackie Milburn whose statue is erected there.

For many outside the football world, the name will mean nothing but in the north east, it remains iconic: 17,000 attended his funeral.

One of our friend’s daughters owned a weekend cottage just outside Alnwick, north of Newcastle, and the four of us stayed there for a couple of nights. The cottage is up for sale so the telephone, television and internet were not available and we were in such a remote part, the mobile phone signal was non-existent. So Watford FC’s loss at Leicester was a secret I unearthed the following day.

The countryside was impressive, the meals at local restaurants were good and there was plenty of real ale including one fetching little number called Canny Bevvy. “Pint of Canny Bevvy please.” rolled off the lips as we indulged in the colloquialisms.

We visited the Grace Darling Museum – free and very interesting. Grace was famous in her 20s and dead by 28.

We moved on to Seahouses and took the dogs for a bracing walk along the wide beach, meeting numerous others doing the same. We enjoyed the red-brown stonework of the villages if not the extra nip in the air..

Naturally, living in France, treats such as fish’n’chips and real ale are beyond our reach so it was good to indulge and the fish up north tasted really good.

We have spent so much time abroad in recent years, plus our holidays for some 30 years before that, it was strange to be travelling around the UK for pleasure and not as part of my job.

It was good to catch up with old friends but also to investigate deeper into the North-East beyond the environs of the football grounds I have visited so often. We plan further detours the next time we are back in England.

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